KALAMAZOO, MI -- The Kalamazoo City Commission will review applications for city manager candidates Sept. 9 and plan to select a new city manager by the end of that month, according to a schedule city commissioners approved Monday.

Kalamazoo City HallKalamazoo Gazette file

Under the tentative schedule provided by Deerfield, Ill.-based Voorhees Associates LLC, city commissioners will review candidate applications to replace retiring City Manager Kenneth Collard the afternoon of Sept. 9 from a list of candidates vetted by Voorhees. In all, 59 candidates have applied for the city's top job, said Jerome Post, the city's human resources director.

Candidates will undertake two days of interviews starting Thursday, Sept. 26. That day, they will go on a tour in the morning and will have lunch with civic leaders chosen by city commissioners. Each commissioner can choose up to four civic leaders to go to the lunch planned for the Radisson Plaza Hotel & Suites, but commissioners will not attend.

The first day will continue with candidates' community presentations in commission chambers from 5 to 9 p.m., with a max of 20 minutes for each candidate. Following the community presentations, candidates would attend a community reception at the Kalamazoo Institute of Arts.

On Friday, Sept. 27, candidates will have time to meet with key city staff and all city staff during the day. They also will be allowed to explore the city. City commissioners will interview the candidates from 4 to 10 p.m. Interviews will be streamed on the web and on cable access.

All resident comment from the community reception and staff comments from their meetings with the candidates will be submitted to commissioners. Residents will be able to continue to submit comments on the candidates through the weekend.

Commissioners will convene Sept. 30 to deliberate on vote on their top two final candidates.

This process will mark the second time commissioners have interviewed city manager candidates to replace Collard this year. Commissioners chose Voorhees to conduct a rebooted search for the next city manager after firing a previous search firm and reopening the search in May. The price tag for this search is $19,900.

Collard is one of more than 200 city employees accepting an early-retirement offer rolled out by his administration.

Emily Monacelli is a local government reporter for MLive/Kalamazoo Gazette. Contact her at emonacel@mlive.com. Follow her on Twitter.